Headlines Archives - EpiGenie | Epigenetics, Stem Cell, and Synthetic Biology News

Headlines

Ever get that feeling that you forgot something? Well maybe you did, but it doesn't have to be recent epigenetics research if you scope out our Headlines each week.

Search Articles

MERA Uses a CRISPR/Cas9 Trio to Home in On Enhancers

February 4, 2016

Mapping the dark matter of the genome is no easy chore. Enhancers love to hide and often don’t act as expected. But thankfully, there’s a handy new CRISPR/Cas9 tool to fluoresce the genomes darkest regulatory secrets. The multiplexed editing regulatory assay (MERA) is a clever system that pushes back the limits of CRISPR/Cas9 as a […]

DNA Origami For Smart Membrane Channels

January 28, 2016

DNA is pretty great for a lot of reasons. There is the whole “central component of life,” of course, but DNA is also a pretty great building material. Making super-tiny, nano-scale objects seems like a really hard problem, but biology does this all the time. Life’s standard nano-brick is protein, but proteins are difficult to re-engineer, […]

DNA Methylation and Transcription Data from Single Stem Cells

January 28, 2016

Ever wanted to be able to do two things at the same time? Like work and have a social life? Eat pizza and still fit in your new purchases? Pat your head and rub your belly? While these highly important combinations remain almost impossible (at least for the EpiGenie staff), a stellar cast of scientists […]

RNA Hydroxymethylcytosine Targets the Messenger

January 28, 2016

A new paper adds another RNA modification to the list already published, but with exciting news for the epigenetics enthusiasts out there… the characterized modification is RNA 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmrC), an important mark previously discovered on DNA. The laboratory of François Fuks at ULB in Brussels decided to look deeper into the presence of 5hmC on […]

Viva in vivo Gene Editing: A Roundup of the Latest CRISPR Hits

January 28, 2016

Gene editing with CRISPR/Cas9 is here, there, and everywhere. We have seen gene editing in human somatic cells, pluripotent stem cells, and even embryos. However, we should also be looking at CRISPR-based gene editing somewhere else: in a living, breathing human. The question is – where does the current technology stand on the in vivo […]

Casilio: a CRISPR/Cas9 and Pumilio Hybrid for Epigenome Editing

January 24, 2016

Life is full of challenges, and when that challenge is epigenome editing even a rock star like CRISPR/Cas9 stands to benefit from helping a hand. Epigenome editing with CRISPR/Cas9 involves using a dead Cas9 (dCas9) that confers the precision of the genome editing system without nuclease activity. The standard approach involves utilizing a fusion protein […]

CRISPR Gene Editing Prefers the Naïve Side of Pluripotency

January 11, 2016

While many across the universe have been pondering over the decision between the light and the dark side of the Force, a more pressing decision confronts CRISPR-based gene editing in stem cells: the primed or the naïve side of pluripotency!? Pluripotent Stem Cells (PSCs), such as human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs), human embryonic stem […]

LobChIP: A Single Day ChIP-Seq Library Preparation Hack

January 9, 2016

With the speed and power of today’s high-throughput sequencers it seems that chromatin immunoprecipitation is the ‘limiting reagent’ in your ChIP-Seq reaction. Usually ChIP-Seq immunoprecipitation and library preparation takes 4 or 5 days, but now a talented team from Uppsala University in Sweden bring forth the library-on-beads ChIP (lobChIP) protocol, which wraps that up into […]

A Synthetic Transcriptional Repressor That’s Anything but Plain

January 9, 2016

Synthetic gene circuits, just like electronic circuits, are built from parts that take an input, process it, and pass on an output. The toolbox of parts for gene circuits has long been limited to those found somewhere in nature, particularly when it comes to sensing an input. Typically, these systems repurpose a natural transcription factor that […]

tRNA Fragments Beat DNA Methylation in the Game of Paternal Intergenerational Epigenetic Inheritance

January 9, 2016

The fact that parental diet affects the metabolism of offspring goes to show that inheritance can be shaped by environmental factors. While early studies focused on mom’s contribution, we’re now starting to see the importance of paternal contribution for shaping an offspring’s epigenome. For the past 15 years, the lab of Oliver Rando at the […]